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This study was an investigation into instructional strategies considered to be the most efficient in the achievement of defined educational aims. Specifically the purpose was to determine teachers' ratings of the importance of certain cognitive, psychomotor, and affective objectives of foreign language (English) instruction in Finland. These ratings were obtained by means of a questionnaire sent to teachers of elementary, intermediate, and advanced English throughout Finland. The differences in responses were attributed to the varied personal-social background and training of the teachers. Statistical analyses and comparisons of the ratings at all levels are given in detail. The objectives in the cognitive and psychomotor domains dealing with spoken language as content and knowledge and perception as pupil behaviors were rated as the most important at all levels. None of the affective objectives were considered unimportant. The most important objectives at each level were those connected to content. Extensive bibliographic references and appendixes of statistical data are included. (LG)

Eighteen papers, 11 in English, and 6 in Finnish and 1 in German are presented on the general theme "Language--Knowledge and Skill," a theme that emphasizes the need to examine the communicative goal in foreign language education from the perspective of both theory and practice. The English-language articles on foreign language testing, following opening remarks at the Heinola seminar by Kalevi Pohjala include: "Criterion- referenced Testing in Foreign Language Teaching" (Sauli Takala); "Tests of Reduced Redundancy--Theory" (Christine Klein-Braley); "Tests of Reduced Redundancy--The C-Test, A Practical Example" (Raatz, Ulrich); "Testing Language Skills in the Norwegian Comprehensive School" (Lars Sigfred Evensen); "Effect of Mixing Ability Groups on Ability Levels Attained" (John H. A. L. de Jong); "Testing Communication Skills in Mixed-Ability Groups" (Viljo Kohonen); "On the Whys and Hows of Language Testing" (Torsten Lindblad); "Current Trends in FL Testing in Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union" (Jan Prucha); "From Testing Research to Educational Policy: Introducing a New Comprehensive Test of Oral Proficiency" (Elana Shohamy, Thea Reves, Yael Bejarano); "Language Testing in German Schools--Theory and Practice" (Bernd Voss); and "The Teaching of Testing: Reliability, Validity, and All That Stuff" (Douglas K. Stevenson). (MSE)

A collection of papers on language testing addresses these topics: language tests seen from a communicative viewpoint; microcomputers and testing; productive second language skills; developing teachers' assessment skills; content validity of holistic tests; statistical regression in group conversation tests; reading comprehension; unique articulatory and auditory dimensions for English as a second language data; foreign language needs in Czechoslovakia; language test dimensionality; adolescent native language proficiency assessment; assessment at the end of secondary school; estimating the quantity of students' second language vocabulary; the language laboratory; informal assessment; cultural knowledge as part of language skills in cross-cultural communication; and classroom English for German schools. (MSE)